Therapeutic leg and foot splints are commonly used on bedfast patients to correct or facilitate the healing of a variety of problems relating to the patient's feet. The functional aspects of such splints are disclosed and fully discussed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,976,059 issued Aug. 24, 1976. The splint of that patent discloses a curved heel portion that is enlarged with respect to a patient's foot to permit lateral visible examination of the patient's heel. That patent also discloses a stabilizer bar which can extend laterally from the back of the splint to hold the splint, and hence the patient's foot or leg, in a predetermined desirable position.
However, since the sores on a bedfast patient's heel are commonly on the rearward surface of the heel, the splint of said patent does not permit full visibility of the patient's heel. Furthermore, the stabilizer bar of this patent does not have sufficient interlocking surfaces with the splint to always prevent the stabilizer bar from becoming disaligned from its desired predetermined position.
Therefore, it is a principal object of this invention to provide a plastic foot splint which has an aperture in the rearward portion of the heel to permit visual examination of the rearward portion of a patient's heel who is wearing the splint. Visibility is gained through the aperture of this invention, depending on the position of the patient, either by direct visual contact, or by the use of a mirror held in spaced relation to the aperture.
A further object of this invention is to provide interlocking ratchet teeth between one end of the stabilizer bar and the rearward surface of the leg portion of the splint to insure that the stabilizer bar will not be inadvertently moved from its desired position by the weight of the patient's leg or movement of the patient's leg.
These and other objects will be apparent to those skilled in the art.